“—Right here!”
✦ ✦ ✦
The moment Hinami’s Found, the one on the left side, went up to the top of the screen, I threw two flash-bangs at once with just a slight delay between them; I aimed them right under the top, where the explosion would just barely reach the top left.
“…!” Hinami panicked and changed direction, but she was too late.
Since in this game, up-down movement started off slow, my shuriken hit her Found as he was trying to move downward, and then—
—Found had lost momentum and was in his stunned animation from the hit, so he was unable to avoid the other flash-bang that came for him during his invincibility frames. A second hit.
“Ahhhhh!” Hinami cried out loud. Getting hit with two flash-bangs meant Hinami’s Found’s HP was now zero.
“All right!”
I pumped a fist, and everyone watching cheered, too. Hinami had been winning the whole time, so her first loss got everyone excited. She was like the away team, even though it was her birthday.
“Hold on, that double bomb! That play was against the rules in the Hinami household!”
“Huh? What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked.
“You always win if you time it right. We decided that strategy made it boring, so double bombing was against the rules!”
“Oh, really? …But that’s too bad.”
“What?”
And then I used idiot logic to tackle this matter of dispute, childishly puffing out my chest. “This isn’t Go Go Oinko; it’s Throw Throw Found, so that rule hasn’t been made yet.”
“Ngh…b-but!”
I cut Hinami off and waved a finger at her. “Tsk-tsk-tsk. Besides, you said double bomb, right? Unfortunately, what I used was…a double flash-bang.”
Hinami gave me a frustrated glare. “Nghh. O-one more time,” she said.
She was such a sore loser, so childlike—or maybe gamer-like.
It made me think that we were really alike in this way.
“Okay, you two, don’t get so worked up.” Izumi plonked a light chop down on each of our heads. “It’s about time for the games to end…and there is our surprise at the end, too, you know!”
“O-oh yeah, sorry,” I apologized. “…Well, we’ve got all night, and we can play games any time.”
“You still want to play?! There’s tomorrow, too, so you need to go to bed, okay?!”
Izumi launched a mom-elemental attack and disconnected the tablet. Now displayed on the projector instead was the default screen of a DVD player.
“…A video?” Hinami said, puzzled, and Nakamura and Takei nodded with confidence.
“All right, then, finally, we have some celebratory remarks from the Association of Aoi Gratitude!” Izumi said, and then she flipped off the lights.
The projector screen was now brighter than before, and it displayed the empty hallway of Sekitomo High School.
✦ ✦ ✦
“Aoi! Happy birthday!”
✦ ✦ ✦
A total of six people popped out from the edges of the screen. It included Tachibana and Kashiwazaki-san, those classmates who weren’t with us.
✦ ✦ ✦
“Man, the one problem here is that we can’t be there to celebrate with you when it’s your big day.”
“Yeah, totally! Last year was a weekday, right? We all celebrated it together.”
“Once you come back, let’s have a big party!”
✦ ✦ ✦
“…Ah-ha-ha, sorry,” Hinami muttered while watching that video.
In the dark, where this projector was the only light, I couldn’t properly read her expression.
✦ ✦ ✦
“You never show your weaknesses, but you’re allowed to show them sometimes!”
“Ohh! Well said!”
“I-it is, isn’t it?!”
“Then have a wonderful seventeenth!”
✦ ✦ ✦
That wrapped up the remarks from everyone, and then the video ended with a clicking sound.
And so the surprise from Izumi was done—or so I thought.
The screen brightened once more.
✦ ✦ ✦
“Aoi-senpai! Happy birthday!”
“Happy birthday, Hinami.”
✦ ✦ ✦
It showed six girls in front of the track clubroom.
In other words, this time, it was a message from her teammates in her club.
✦ ✦ ✦
“We really admire you, Hinami-senpai! It’s like you’re on another level, even among the senpais!”
“Come on, give us some admiration, too.”
“Huh? But that’s really not the right person to be admiring!”
“Hey…”
✦ ✦ ✦
They were all just informal birthday greetings.
But it didn’t feel like they’d just filmed it because Izumi had told them to. It was as if they were openly communicating what they really thought.
✦ ✦ ✦
“We’ll keep up with this club’s traditions, even after you’ve retired!”
“We’ll teach all the newbies your way of keeping the track and field neat!”
“I’ll take…take care of the…shoelaces you gabe me…Hinami-senbai!”
“Hey, don’t cry! This is her birthday, not graduation.”
✦ ✦ ✦
“Ah-ha-ha…Shima-chan…” Hinami was laughing, but you could tell there was emotion in her voice.
✦ ✦ ✦
The people who appeared spanned all the way from her track-club advisor who had left when Hinami was in first year, and the rival she’d competed against at track nationals, to the owner of the restaurant in Omiya with delicious cheese that she often went to.
✦ ✦ ✦
“Aoi-chan!”
✦ ✦ ✦
“Hinami-san!”
✦ ✦ ✦
“Hinami!”
✦ ✦ ✦
The names they called and their congratulations vividly indicated all the things Hinami had done.
Most of that had probably just been interaction through a cold mask for the sake of social success, proving her way was right. She was using them to tamp down her own fragility.
But—
✦ ✦ ✦
—what Hinami had been doing for her own sake had generated this much respect and goodwill.
✦ ✦ ✦
So many people were thankful to her and wanted her to be happy, going to the trouble of sending her birthday greetings.
“Hey, Hinami.”
I thought this was one answer for the way Hinami was.
“…Now you get it, right?”
I approached her as her gaze was captured by the video, I and told her what I really thought, so that only she could hear.
Up close, her eyes appeared wet—or was that just the light of the projector reflecting off her eyes in the dark?
Or had she gotten emotionally shaken up so many times in one day that their innocent goodwill was reaching beyond her mask?
She was the only one who would know the answer to that.
“…Get what?” The voice that reached my ears sounded as if it was smothering the emotions in it by force.
“Even if it is ‘formalities.’ Do it over and over, and it’ll reach you eventually.”
I recalled a guy who had recently acquired the passion to keep going.
I was thinking of a couple who’d gone through repeated trial and error to try to attain something special.
And I was gazing at the game-loving girl in front of me, who only knew how to throw herself into battle.
“Maybe you only ever thought the stuff you’ve done was for your proof.” Both how she dealt with everyone, and my life strategy, too. “But it’s helped me, all of us here, our classmates, your teammates, and even the teachers—everyone. They’ve all gotten something important from you.”
I was sure my words were reaching where I wanted them to.
“So that’s enough.”
For some reason, I could really feel that was true.
✦ ✦ ✦
“You’re enough as you are, Aoi Hinami.”
✦ ✦ ✦
And then the screen went dark again, and Izumi officiated in a cheery tone, “—All right, then the next is the final message!”
After a darkness that lasted a little longer than before, the final video began.
✦ ✦ ✦
But then—
✦ ✦ ✦
—the controller that had still been in Aoi Hinami’s hands fell to the floor with a clatter.
✦ ✦ ✦
“…Huh?”
✦ ✦ ✦
Displayed on the big protector screen were some people I’d only met once—
✦ ✦ ✦
“—Happy birthday, Aoi.”
✦ ✦ ✦
It was Aoi Hinami’s mother, and her younger sister.